Strangers
volunteer to help freed HomolkaPeople
offering money: Lawyer
Some even want her as roommate

Jun. 22, 2005. 06:37 AM

DALE ANN FREEDSTAFF REPORTER

MONTREAL
— Strangers are stepping forward to offer Karla Homolka places to live and
even financial support when she's released from prison in less than two weeks,
says her lawyer, Sylvie Bordelais.

The offers of help are coming mostly from women, some of them mothers, who
believe that Canada's most notorious female inmate deserves a break in starting
her new life after serving the full 12-year sentence for her role in the
slayings of teenagers Kristen French and Leslie Mahaffy, Bordelais said in a
wide-ranging — and rare — interview with the Toronto Star at her
office in the northeast end of this city.

While not disclosing specific details about the would-be benefactors, Bordelais
said some people are even offering to share an apartment with Homolka. It's
expected that the 35-year-old St. Catharines native will go on welfare and live
in Montreal.

Bordelais, a 41-year-old native of Paris, has been representing Homolka for four
years, but it was only recently that the lawyer shot to national prominence
after a hearing to determine if restrictions should be placed on Homolka after
her release.

For Bordelais, representing Homolka at the hearing was a matter of principle.
Homolka had lived up to her end of the plea bargain and there was no need for
further restrictions on her freedom, the lawyer argued.

"When you pay your debt to society you are done with it," she said.

But Bordelais lost that legal battle, and for a lawyer who has built a career
championing the rights of prison inmates, it was a bitter blow, say those who
know her.

Since the hearing, Bordelais said, about 30 criminal lawyers have called her or
emailed their support, along with their concerns over the outcome of what was
known as the 810 hearing, a reference to the section of the Criminal Code that
allows authorities to place restrictions on inmates after they leave prison, and
what it means to the rights of inmates.

Homolka must observe the restrictions, such as reporting regularly to police,
for a year, or risk going back to jail.

Bordelais says she dealt with Homolka the way she treats all her clients.
"I try to see all of them as human beings, no matter what they did."

She met Homolka in 1998 when she was transferred to Joliette after the women's
prison in Kingston closed.

When asked how her star client is doing, Bordelais would say only that "she
is stressed."